Christmas with the Purtills

Tim's family welcomed me into their home to celebrate this years Christmas. It was my first Christmas spent away from my family, and I must admit I was a bit sad, but the Purtills made me feel right at home. We decorated the house, sang along to Christmas songs, planned an ellaborate Christmas eve dinner (complete with my attempt at a Red Velvet cake), and played Klog (a game that Tim got for Christmas, somewhere between Baci and bowling) in the back yard. And check out Tim the Christmas tree :)

Derby Day, Part 2

I've now been in Melbourne long enough to start experiencing things twice. For instance, Derby Day, Part 2. There were repeat activities. Lots of gambling, lots of champagne (although, as part of my lessons learned, I drank water as well), and lots of pretty dresses and nice suits! New occurrences included Tim sporting a beautiful blue hat! Great fun all around, yet again!

Halloween in Melbourne

Last August when I arrived in Melbourne, I was shocked to discover that Halloween is not a vastly celebrated holiday in Australia like it is back home. As Halloween is one of my favorite holidays, this news was overwhelmingly disappointing. So, I decided to host a Halloween party this year, given I have a house and all. After fielding several questions about costume ideas, to which I responded that Halloween costumes do not always have to be scary, I was quite pleased with the array of creativity that showed up at my door. And what's more, we were able to combine the party with Skye's birthday celebration, so it was a night enjoyed by all! Tim and I went as Peace and Quiet - he dressed up as a mime, and I was a hippie!

Skye, Lois (Tim and Skye's mum), Dana, and I had a great time prepping all day before the party (the boys found an excuse to get out of party prep)! We baked, and baked, and baked some more - there was a gigantic spider cake, cheese pumpkins, mummy toes, small chocolate spiders, Day of the Dead punch complete with a frozen ice hand, scary Halloween music, spider webs everywhere, and Halloween movies going in the background.

We even had a costume contest with prize Halloween-themed bottles of wine in titles like "Killer Stiletto" and "Dungeon Gully". Some notable turnouts included: a bunch of grapes (Dana), white trash (Dave), a mermaid (Belinda), Steve Erwin and his killer stingray (Andrew and Amber), Medusa (Skye), Ghostrider (Shane), Borgs from Startrek (Emily and Jess), Aladdin and Jasmine (Chris and Jinee), and of course, yours truly and her mime =)

Reminiscence

As much as I like living in Australia, there are some things I'm starting to miss about home. Dana, a friend from home who has been backpacking down under for about 10 months now, is currently staying with me in Melbourne. Last night, we were reminiscing about the things we missed most:

1) Chick-Fil-A.
2) A trip to the local Mexican hot spot for chips, salsa, and margaritas (Melbourne has like 3 Mexican restaurants, and they do not use spices).
3) Iced tea, southern style.
4) Driving to the store at 2am in the morning, because you know it will be open and stocked with whatever your heart desires at that time of morning.
5) Not hearing "Ta", short for "Thanks" here. Why "Thanks" needs to be shortened, I will never understand.
6) Central heating and air conditioning.

Byron Bay

We flew to Byron Bay for Tim's 31st birthday. Byron is a cute little hippie surfing beach town on the eastern coast of Australia. From an authentic fish and chips experience, to quality breakfasts each morning, to a healthy game of beach volleyball, we all had a great time. Tim and I stayed one more day after everyone had left, to have some time to ourselves. We adventured out to the tip of the peninsula to watch the sun set over the ocean. We even went hang-gliding, which was awesome fun! I was a bit nervous, and couldn't seem to relax despite my peaceful and relaxing surroundings. We rode separately, Tim then me, and during my ride the instructor offered to elope with me to Fiji on our glider. I thought Tim might get jealous, so I politely declined. It was a great mini-vacation!

Tree Planting

Every year, Tim and his family and friends head 4 hours north of Melbourne to go tree planting, and I was invited to join along this year. It was a weekend full of camping, digging and planting, campfires, and generally having a good time. I've already forgotten the names of the trees that we planted, but between about 200 volunteers, we managed to plant 10,000 trees (or so they told us) over a period of 1.5 days. Not bad. They also took us to see the trees that had been planted the year before, and which had a 80% success rate. It was pretty cool, I must say =)

Au Revoir, Babsi!

Elizabeth Bishop once wrote:

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.
[...]
Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant to travel.
None of these will bring disaster.

Does the art of losing really get easier? Like going numb? One of my few but close girlfriends here in Australia, Barbara, (affectionately referred to as Babsi) has decided to move to Kuala Lumpur for work with her partner, Troy. My first reaction was surprise at such a big decision. Then I thought of my own decision to move half way across the world to live and work, and my surprise turned to understanding and acceptance. Of course, I am still sad, and will miss Babsi terribly. But now....I'm looking forward to visiting her and Troy in Malaysia =)

Housewarming, Finally

Once we finally got around to throwing our housewarming, Dena and I had settled into our place quite nicely. I was quite surprised by how many people turned out - maybe it was our rental daiquiri machine that attracted them :) We had a great time though, and only minor catastrophes including a few red wine spills on our periwinkle carpet, and one broken picture frame. Granted, hanging thatframe and its friends was quite a saga, and I found myself pretty upset after the incident, but Timmy proved quite the supportive boyfriend. A great time was had by all, and we managed to keep from tearing up our new house, which is always a good thing.

July 4th in Melbourne

Ok - I know I haven't posted in a while, but I never claimed to be the world's most dedicated blogger. Besides, I had a few things going on =) Anyways, a few stories to catch up on....

I was able to celebrate 4th of July in Melbourne thanks to some fellow patriots and their drive to carry on familiar traditions! There weren't any fireworks, or BBQs on the lawn (it being winter and all here), but there was a lot of red, white, and blue, and several pubs to represent in! And check out Tim in his patriotic gear - I swear I heard him say this was one of his proudest moments ever. =)

My New Place!

I finally have a home! Dena and I found an adorable 2-story townhouse right outside the city, and within walking distance to the market and great shopping (dangerous!) Quite excited about not living in a hotel room any more - we have a great kitchen, which hopefully I will make good use of. It's been fun (but also a little stressful) trying to furnish the place, given I came over with nothing but clothes. Hopefully it will start feeling a bit like home soon. I just have to get over all the blue carpet and Breakfast at Tiffany's curtains =)

Below, from left to right: Looking at the front gate/courtyard from our living room window; kitchen as you continue walking past living room; dining area; living room which is on the left when you first walk in; back courtyard looking out from sliding doors in dining area; bathroom upstairs; looking down from the top of the stairs (that's the front door you can see); and finally, my bedroom.

A New Chapter

I've come to learn time and again that life is unpredictable and has a way of steering you down unforseen paths. Three years ago, I never would have imagined I'd get the chance to work in Australia, and 10 months ago, when I got that chance, I never dreamed I'd actually move here.

Well, here I am. After three wonderful weeks spent at home saying my goodbyes and packing up my life, I have relocated half-way around the world to spend a year working down under. No more 20 hour flights every 4-6 weeks, no more living out of a suitcase, and in another week, my hotel room will be replaced by an actual house with an actual kitchen. It's quite possibly one of the biggest decisions I've made so far in my quarter century of life, but I know it's the right one, and I'm only looking forward.

So stay tuned, I've got another year's worth of adventures ready to share with you, starting with pictures of my new home! Until then, much love.

A Day in the Dandenongs

We decided to spend the day picnicking in the Dandenong Mountains, so we packed our lunch and were off. It was only an hour drive from Melbourne, but far enough away to escape the bustle of city life. It was a fun day, spent wandering through the tree and fern-lit paths. Tim's rock-climbing experience helped him ease up this tree, but it took much convincing that the treehole was spiderless before I finally climbed in.

We made our way to the famous Rhodendrum gardens. Unfortunately, we missed the acres of blooming flowers by about, oh, 6 months or so, but it was still quite gorgeous to see everything in the color of Autumn. We'll have to go back again when everything is in full bloom.

And here are the series of Where's Nicki photos. Can you find me?